The endless poetry of spaceSends shivers across my spine,
And there upon the threshold soundsThe now distant drone of time.

Music fills the spacecraftStarlight fills the night,
And there upon the threshold thinkI wonder, was I right?

David Oesper

The Planets was written by Holst between 1914 and 1916, and the premiere performance was at The Queen’s Hall, London, on September 29, 1918. Adrian Boult conducted the orchestra in a private performance for about 250 invited guests. The Queen’s Hall was destroyed by an incendiary bomb during the London Blitz in 1941, seven years after Holst’s death in 1934.

Pluto was discovered by Clyde Tombaugh in 1930, and was considered to be the ninth planet until its controversial demotion by the IAU in 2006. A number of composers have added a Pluto movement to ThePlanets (“Pluto, the Renewer” by Colin Matthews, for example), and even an improvised performance (“Pluto, the Unpredictable”) by Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic. I remember enjoying “Pluto, the Unknown” by American composer Peter Hamlin performed by the Des Moines Symphony in 1992, but unfortunately no recording of this work exists.